


Death Takes A Holiday: The Borders of Head and Heart

by LyraNgalia, rude_not_ginger



Series: Death Takes A Holiday [7]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Action/Adventure, Belligerent Sexual Tension, Betrayal, Canon-Typical Violence, Car Sex, Crimes & Criminals, Criminal Masterminds, F/M, Gen, Great Hiatus, Heist, Misunderstandings, Museums, Orgasm Control, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Post-Reichenbach, Public Sex, Road Trips, Sex in a Car, Sexual Tension, Toronto, Unhealthy Relationships, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Unsafe Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-09
Updated: 2015-02-14
Packaged: 2018-03-06 19:19:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3145628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LyraNgalia/pseuds/LyraNgalia, https://archiveofourown.org/users/rude_not_ginger/pseuds/rude_not_ginger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Resurrected and reunited, Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes find themselves evading Mycroft Holmes' net while solving the mystery of why Sebastian Moran saved them both in San Salvador. But the Consulting Detective and the Woman may have different plans on what to do with their new knowledge. Will they continue to trust each other, or will their plans finally break their resolve?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Lesson in Culture

**Author's Note:**

> Please see [_Death Takes A Holiday: In the Shadow of the Black Mountain_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/694742) for notes/explanations on the peculiarities of this fic's writing style.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leaving Montreal behind, Irene and Sherlock race from Quebec in hopes of evading Mycroft. But what they stumble onto in Toronto may slow them down...

Nearly five hours with a single stop along the way, and they reach Toronto. His earlier suggestion had been percolating through Irene's mind and between the signs in the city and a quick peek at her mobile, she manages navigates (with only one wrong turn and unnecessary detour) to downtown Toronto, towards a museum building that looked rather like a violent altercation between a particularly vicious architect and an equally stubborn clergyman.  
  
"Car shopping?" she asks, gesturing towards the parking structure nearby.

 

Despite what he expected, Sherlock's nerves did not give out throughout the course of the driving expedition. In fact, after he got accustomed to the Woman's driving style, he was able to focus more on conversation, and on (correctly) deducing the identity of the former owner of the vehicle. He only had the New Jersey accent he wasn't able to verify.  
  
He looks up at the museum and tilts his head.  
  
"Art?" he inquires.

 

"As much as I'd enjoy a Byzantine mosaic, I expect art theft might defeat the purpose of traveling light," she answers with a smirk, watching as a dark blue minivan pulled into the parking structure ahead of her. Irene mentally dismissed that particular choice from her calculations.  
  
"Or have you changed your mind about switching cars before meeting Moran?"

 

"No, I mean the structure," he says. "Something that offensive would be art in London."  
  
He dismisses the van initially as well, but he turns his head to look at it. The door shape is interesting. Odd, actually. As though they've been re-purposed.  
  
"It is my turn to drive, mind."

 

"I expect the only reason it hasn't been demolished is somebody considers it art," she agrees. She pulls into the parking structure behind the dark blue van, glancing over at him again. "And I don't recall ever agreeing that I'd share the drive."

 

"I don't recall agreeing that I'd remain a passenger the entire drive, either," he says. He stares at the van, at the burn mark on the side of the bumper, at the shade of paint and the strokes used. He sniffs as he looks ahead, and turns his head to look back at the museum.  
  
"There's a more pressing situation we have to worry about, though," he says. "The robbery that's about to take place at the museum there. Not that they'll notice, they're about to be bombarded with a rather substantial number of fakes. Might take them years to work it out."

 

She turns to look at him, her expression somewhere on the spectrum between surprised and impressed. "An interesting diversion from our own bit of theft," she says, then gestures to the van in front of them.  
  
"What gave it away?"

 

"Burn marks on the bumper," he says. "That's from a commercial grade oven, but not one that's working properly. Best way to age a painting, you know this I'm certain, is to bake it. And then there's the brush strokes on the van. Large artistic brushes, not proper car painting materials. That van has been painted for the sole purpose of disguising it during the exchange."  
  
He narrows his eyes. "The doors, though. I can't work out the doors."

 

The fact that he admits he can't work something out is worthy of comment. But instead, Irene finds her eyes drawn to the doors in question, edging their own vehicle just a shade to the right so that she had a better angle. There is something about the way the doors sat that tugs at her memory.  
  
And that, along with the prospect of figuring out a piece of the puzzle before he did, spurs her on. It takes a few seconds before she recognizes what about it had seemed so familiar.  
  
"They're expecting to either bring in something extremely large or an extremely large number of them, the way they've modified the door hinges."

 

"Raised lift as opposed to the doors opening outwards," he agrees with a nod. He may or may not give her a side look, slightly annoyed that she worked it out before he did. Not that he doubted his own abilities in working it out. It simply was....well, annoying to come in second.  
  
"Large," he says. "Would make more sense, needing to get that extra width blocked by the side-opened doors."

 

Her smile deepens in response, either at his sidelong look or the simple knowledge that he was annoyed. The minivan begins to slow, and Irene cuts around it in the parking garage, as if peeling away to look for a parking spot, like any normal museum patron.  
  
"Not many paintings would need that much width," she considers. A glance towards the museum entrance showed the valets' key cabinet she'd expected, and another glance showed the van turning, following a sign to the service entrance. "False paintings and some liberated sculpture, perhaps. Care to find out?"

 

"I did need to stretch my legs for a bit."  
  
He doesn't, not really. He has been known to stay in the same position for days (and, during one particular case, two weeks.) It's the van that interests him. The flagrant lack of hiding when it comes to the vehicle, the obvious lack of care in its maintenance, those don't speak to someone who would steal art. No, there's something far more interesting going on.  
  
"Shall we feign an interest in the museum itself?"

 

"Some of us don't have to feign an interest in culture," she says archly as she pulls the car into a vacant parking spot. From the spot, there is a clear line to the valet's key cabinet, if they chose to acquire a new vehicle on their way out.  
  
"The service entrance should be directly below us, a level down."

 

"I have no reason to be interested in Canadian culture," Sherlock replies with a short snort. "I'd rather learn about the solar system."  
  
He'd tried to delete the solar system again, but its importance on the case with Jim wasn't forgotten. This, however, would be. At least, the uninteresting bits.

 

"Mm, that sounds like a challenge, finding a way to make Canadian culture _memorable_ ," she says with a laugh. Irene pauses to study the two valets in front of the entry with a sharp eye.  
  
The first, young with dark curly hair, obviously smitten with his coworker, and working a second job at night at a local gay bar. The other, unaware of her coworker's poorly hidden affections, clearly a university student, an art student, perhaps...

 

"Note the shoes," Sherlock says, briefly glancing in the direction the Woman is looking.  
  
The girl, obviously a law student with a preference for writing in pencil, was in shoes with a short but sharp heel, in order to practice walking in them over extended periods of time, even on uneven ground. It was a sign of a very intelligent student, though her taste in short-heeled shoes left much to be desired.  
  
He checked the mirror to be certain all traces of makeup from before were gone before he opened his door.  
  
"She would, however, be very manipulable to a mentor."

 

The stop they'd made before Toronto had allowed Irene to put herself more to rights, to trade the androgynous young man's disguise for the dress and flats of the day before. But without the lipstick and with her hair around her shoulders, she appeared simply like any other well-heeled woman, the sort of person who could, and would, take in a museum in the middle of the day.  
  
"Is that a suggestion or are you volunteering?" she asks, climbing out of the car, careful not to put weight immediately on one leg. The constant sitting had not impaired her, but she recognized that her wounded leg would appreciate a more ginger approach. "After all, I'm not the one with the most recent experience in heels."

 

He lets out a half laugh.  
  
"Might make her compatriot jealous," he replies. "No matter the gender I'm appearing as."

 

"The implication being that I wouldn't?" she murmurs, giving him a sidelong glance. Their motion catches the male valet's attention for a moment, but as they clearly did _not_ need valet service, he returned his attention to the student. Closer now, Irene revised her opinion; no, not an art student. Not with that callus on her thumb.  
  
She tilts her head, listening for an alarm, a noise, but hears only the steady echoing silence of the parking garage and the sound of the valet's unsuccessful flirtation. Irene corrects her steps to head for the valet station, without appearing as though she's heading directly for it.  
  
"Should I be insulted?" she adds below her breath to her companion.

 

"Insulted, no," he says. "Challenged, yes."  
  
He pauses, glancing from left to right, and then back to the Woman.  
  
"For added challenge, if you can make _her_ jealous, I'll be especially impressed."  
  
After all, this is a holiday. No point in being too serious.

 

Her eyes narrow, and her lips thin for a moment in response to his overt manipulation, but that annoyance is tempered by the proposed challenge. But then she catches his eye, and she gives him a sharp, predatory smile that promised retribution for the obvious manipulation.  
  
But then perhaps this was his for her earlier response about waiting until they'd left Montreal. If it was, well, she didn't particularly care. "I'd tell you to be careful who you bait, but something tells me you'd look forward to the result either way," she says, her eyes sweeping over him before she turns her attention towards the pair of valets.  
  
To make the young man jealous would be extraordinarily simple, but the woman... Well, it wasn't difficult, not given the way she stood and the way she looked about her, that air of being used to attention, to being used to being _good_.  
  
Not difficult, but it is going to be _very_ interesting for a few minutes.

 

He could feel his own heart rate rise at the way the Woman's eyebrows moved together, at the look of concentration she gave as she thought of the two of them, of how to manipulate it. She was _good_. She made manipulation an art. And there was very little more attractive in the world than watching an artist at work.  
  
"I'll be interested," he says. "She could be particularly difficult to manipulate."

 

She gives him another sharp sidelong look before approaching the valet station, schooling her expression to mild interest in the museum, in the structure. She slips on an American accent, the Carrington persona's New Jersey, and asks the two valets something inconsequential about the museum, about parking, then transitioning into something about the structure itself, the architecture, drawing their attention to her questions, rather than to her companion and anything he might be inspecting.  
  
The young man's responses are predictable, obviously rote, gleaned from snippets from tour guides and docents. The law student's are more obviously thoughtful, more clearly analytical, especially when Irene mentions the building's unusual architecture. But Irene slowly, carefully returns to the young man's responses, asking the woman her opinion on his regurgitated answers, encouraging her own opinion only often enough to keep her engaged and wanting.  
  
She hears the beginning of frustration, of budding jealousy in the woman's voice, and hides a smile.

 

Sherlock stays aside, first smoking a cigarette, and then peering around the edges of the building. No obvious signs of entry, but for all he knew, they could've already been inside. He looks back at the Woman and her two targets, and is more than a little impressed to already see frustration in the girl's face.  
  
Oh, but the Woman does know what people like and how to use it. She writes manipulation like Bach wrote symphonies.  
  
He straightens his hair and steps up to them, new persona in place. Profession: Assistant. Accent: Welsh.  
  
"Miss Carrington," he says, timidly. "I'm afraid your guide is going to be delayed. It may be up to three hours until he gets here, so we may have to forgo the museum with a guide."

 

There is laughter in her eyes at his feigned timidity, and a hidden smile at her lips, but she doubts either of the valets can see it. They are, after all, too busy with the obvious, with seeing the obviously well-to-do American, her accent bringing to mind wealth and the presence of the scraping assistant importance. Irene frowns, commanding irritation on Alissa Carrington's face, and gestures imperiously to her Welsh assistant.  
  
"Well, certainly we can't make do without a guide, but we seem to have such... well-informed individuals with us," she said dismissively, then gestured to the two valets. She meets the law student's eye just long enough that the young woman's frustration eases to optimism, to hope, and then Irene turns to the young man and his vapid, regurgitated commentary.  
  
"You'll do nicely for the afternoon, won't you, young man?"

 

Oh, Sherlock had to contain himself to keep from bursting into laughter. The girl had clearly not expected to be so easily ignored. Sherlock gives her a short, dismissive nod, and turns back to the Woman and young man.  
  
"Yes, very good, Miss Carrington."  
  
He considers the girl as he follows the young man towards the door. He could reappear in a few moments, ask her for the key to the parking area for the museum, under the pretense of needing something for the Woman. The girl is so flustered at this point, he imagines she won't remember that they didn't park with the valets.  
  
It would give them full access to all of those cars. Excellent.

 

It is a familiar ploy, after all, much like how she'd dismissed him for Mycroft Holmes in a plane full of corpses. Deliberate stings to an ego, deliberately denying someone what they wanted, what they _liked_. The valet-turned-tour guide still looks stunned at his sudden good fortune, his expression rather like what Irene expects people meant when they said 'moon-eyed calf', but he followed instructions well enough and takes the lead without question when Irene gestures he should. He even begins babbling something about the architecture of the hall, of the juxtaposition of modernity and traditional space.  
  
It allows her just enough space to fall back, to beckon to Alissa Carrington's timid assistant as if giving some minor direction about the car. "Be careful," she murmurs to Sherlock. "I might start expecting you to be scraping and on your knees _all_ the time."

 

"Seeing you in such dominance," he replies. "I might just want to be there."  
  
He wouldn't, of course. It would be an excellent novelty, but it's their push-and-pull that interests him immensely. They're always fighting for who is in control, and _that_ , that is what he adores.  
  
"They wouldn't have gone in through the front doors," he murmurs to the Woman. "Too obvious, too many witnesses."

 

She laughs, low, at that. There is no doubt in her mind that he'd never _stay_ submissive. That was part of the game, part of the pleasure and the excitement of how they are. The never ending push-and-pull, the thrill and uncertainty of never being quite certain whether he would submit or she would be caught.  
  
She nods, making some meaningless but moderately interested noise when their valet gestures to a display ahead. "Service entrance downstairs. Fewer witnesses, but there's a gallery," she answers quietly. "Care for a pretext of interest in Indonesian art?"

 

Sherlock's accent slips back into Welsh. "Oh, I don't have any interests apart from keeping you on your schedule, Miss Carrington," he replies, blinking innocently at her. "Would you like me to inform the gentleman of _your_ preferences?"  
  
He nods to the doorway leading downstairs.  
  
"What gallery is down there?" he asks, his question directed to the boy ahead of them.

 

She smirks, and the American accent slips back on like a glove. "Indispensable as always, Jeffrey," she answers archly.  
  
"Special exhibits," the valet says promptly. He then hesitates. Obviously the answer to just _what_ those special exhibits are has not been parroted enough in his hearing. "Japan collection. China. One of those over there."  
  
Irene glances over to her left, where a poster proclaimed the traveling Indonesian gallery below, and nods to their impromptu tour guide. "That will do nicely." A glance at Sherlock, and her lips quirk into a deep smile. "You'll meet us in the gallery once you make arrangements for the car at our next destination? It _must_ be a standard next. You know how much I cannot abide it when the travel agents can't follow orders."

 

He nearly drops character from her request. Standard. She can't drive a---oh, but this is her trying to be clever. If she requests a standard, she expects him to be contrary, to get an automatic. But if he does that, she _will_ drive. He can't possibly win.  
  
"Yes, of course, Miss Carrington," he replies. He starts back towards the door, waiting for the Woman and boy to disappear downstairs before turning back inside, heading up for other exhibits.

 

She watches him out of the corner of her eye, and it is all she can do to keep the laugh from bubbling up as he works through the surprise and the eventual realization. She lets him fall back, and she follows the valet towards the lower galleries. But before they disappear down the stairs, she flashes him a smug, triumphant smile over her shoulder.  
  
She cannot wait to see whether he'll follow orders or get what she _actually_ wants.  
  
But until then, she contents herself with keeping an eye out for the group with the blue minivan, and watching the museum patrons among the exhibits, occasionally making some comment of approval at the valet's insipid attempts at playing tour guide.

 

With a bump into the right patron, he's able to acquire a new mobile. Useful for contacting the Woman in case they need to leave faster than expected. Considering they're both nursing rather serious injuries, he can't help but hope that won't happen.  
  
Statues. Something unwieldy enough to need use of a van with disengaged doors, and something out of sight enough that it wouldn't alert security.  
  
He goes up another flight of stairs before he sees the closed-off exhibit. New discoveries from ancient India. The vase in the picture over the curtain is the same shade as the van.

 

The gallery below is, in fact, very close to the service entrance, and by pausing to examine a collection of intricate jewelry, Irene is able to watch said service entrance in the reflection of the glass. The doors to the service entrance open, and she watches as a pair of what appeared to be museum staff wheel in a large crate, and head for the service elevator, just out of sight of the jewelry display's reflection.  
  
She reaches for her mobile, but upon realizing his mobile rested in pieces on the Canadian highway, left it in her pocket, and instead steered the valet towards a different exhibit, this one also glass enclosed.

 

None of the cameras have been installed in this section. The Woman was right about the stolen art, and the obvious prize is standing in front of Sherlock Holmes now.  
  
He snaps a photograph of it and sends it to the Woman's mobile. A jeweled and painted statue about six feet tall of Innana, a goddess of war. Wrong placement, he thinks. She belongs in the middle east, India is too far. Priceless, he imagines. The jewels would be easy enough to find replicas, and the bright colors would make it easier to forge.

`4th floor. S`

 

Her mobile vibrates in her pocket as the valet mentions something about Malays, and she ignores him to slip the phone out and check the message. The screen is too small to make out much detail, but the intent of the photograph is clear enough for her.  
  
A glance towards the case and the reflection she could see. The workers waiting, seemingly bored, for the service elevator. `Two at the service elevator. Heading up.`

 

The next obvious question is, of course, what to do. They know what they're coming to steal and they have an idea of how these people are going to do it. The only point in stopping them is for the fun of it.  
  
He steps over to the service lift and examines the panel. Just as the Woman had said, it's on its way up. This means he has less than thirty seconds to work _something_ out. Or does he? If he can stop the elevator---He turns to grab a spanner from one of the tables when something catches his eye. A book, sitting at the edge, no sign of dust on it, unlike the rest of the equipment in the area. Canadian Law.  
  
He turns back towards the lift, and the girl, the law student valet, swings a spanner towards his head. The last thing he manages to think before he goes unconscious is that he really, desperately doesn't want the Woman to learn she was right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And for anyone interested, Lyra will once again be at [Sherlock Seattle](http://sherlock-seattle.org/) January 9-11, and would absolutely love to say hello!


	2. The Art of Counterfeit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With two recovering gunshot wounds between them, Sherlock and Irene tread the line between being on the side of the angels and being the spider in her web when they discover a budding art theft ring in the Royal Ontario Museum.

She watches as the service elevator opens its doors, and the two wheel in with their crate. The doors close, and her mobile remains silent in her hand. She isn't certain what to expect, but she expects _something_.  
  
The Sherlock Holmes back in London, the one Moriarty had derisively called being on the side of the angels, would no doubt have wanted to stop them. The triumph of law and order once the puzzle was solved. But the Sherlock Holmes of their holiday was far less so, without the guiding moral hand of one John Watson. There was no way they could steal the statue in question from the would-be art thieves; they had no provisions for it, but blackmail was always an option, someone else to add to the web she would rebuild.  
  
But no text comes, and the light on the service elevator continued to tick upwards. 2...3. Irene frowns, and slips the silent mobile back into her pocket. She ignores the valet, gesturing towards the sign for the washroom, and headed up for the stairs.

 

He isn't unconscious for a terribly long time. He blinks, vision fuzzy, and finds that his hands are tied up to the edge of one of the displays, and a rag has been shoved into his mouth. He tries to cough, but gives up. His shoulder aches.  
  
"Interesting phone for a professional's assistant, eh?" the valet says, holding up the stolen phone. Sherlock hadn't even registered the Hello Kitty cover and sparkly dangles in the procured phone when he used it. It was a means to an end, like the car.  
  
He gives his arm a tug, and it sends another ache up to his shoulder. Right, so it appears to be plastic ties, and he doesn't want to think where the rag came from (he can't help it, mind. There's a slight taste of sweat, possibly paint---probably hers. Revolting. He'll need to rinse his mouth out with disinfectant).  
  
The lift opens, and the men with the crate step out.  
  
"Problem?" one of them says, nodding towards Sherlock.

 

The service elevator moves slower than the ones in the main lobby, but there was little better option than physically climbing the stairs. By the time she hits the fourth floor landing, Irene is ignoring the pain of protest in her leg and forcing her breathing steady as she opens the door of the stairwell and steps out, for all intents and purposes still the demanding diva playing museum patron.  
  
She locates the in-work gallery almost immediately, and approaches it just in time to hear voices. Irene keeps herself as hidden as possible, glancing through the curtain separating the new exhibit from the rest of the museum proper, and sees the precise reason for the lack of text response. She frowns, and watches the three in question. The spurned valet. The two porters. She dismisses Sherlock for the moment as a means of assistance, not tied up as he is, and factors her current state into the equation. No, force is not going to get them anywhere outnumbered like this.  
  
Her frown deepens, and the movement of the valet's hand draws her attention to the purloined phone. She would have laughed, if tension (she refused to think of it as worry) wasn't gnawing at the pit of her stomach. She thinks, and sends another text.  
  
`Would you like to trigger the alarm or shall I do the honours?`

 

The phone lets out a cheerful sound in the girl's hand, and she turns it around. Her eyebrows knit together. The Woman must be close by. She wouldn't just respond, not when they're in the thick of it.  
  
"From the look on your face, I'd say you've just gotten a message from my associate," he says, forcing the foul tasting rag out of his mouth with his tongue. The girl opens her mouth, but Sherlock continues, forcefully spitting the rag out onto the ground. "No, not that one. The one in your van. Going to be a bit difficult to steal anything without a getaway vehicle. Must be why the paint job on that van was so shoddy. You stole it from your place of employment only a few days ago, spent most of your time working on the doors and aging the portraits in that box. Probably a friend of the museum, flying away for a few weeks, so you knew he wouldn't miss it until you were long gone. Except---"  
  
He nods, but the motion makes him dizzy again. "From the sheer number of sticky notes in that book, I'd say you're having difficulty studying. Probably failing out, and you know it. Your ego can't handle the loss, so you're causing this, this theft. Why? Not for the money. No, you need recognition, you need to be acknowledged."

 

Irene rolls her eyes at his speech, at the way he taunts the young woman. The law student turned valet turned art thief. She ignores the fact that normally she would have found the woman's rage at being so baldly laid plain entertaining, that the only reason she doesn't at this moment is that he's gotten himself caught and, judging by the way he moves his head, potentially concussed.  
  
She types another text, but instead of sending it to the pink, purloined phone, Irene taps in a different number before speaking, discarding the New Jersey accent like a scarf or a coat, reveling in the familiar command of her own voice, her own mannerisms.  
  
"Well, recognition is something you'll have soon enough, dear," she says, stepping forward past the curtain concealing the valet and her "friends's" activities. "But I doubt of the type you'd enjoy. Failure tends to stain so much brighter than success." She holds up her phone, and the details of the heist outlined in the on-screen text. "One wrong move out of you or your associates, pet, and I send details of your entire operation to the police, and you can kiss those dreams of notoriety and law school goodbye."

 

He gives the Woman a small grin at her commanding voice. There's little that's quite as _sexy_ as watching her command a situation. He nods towards the others, who are standing, quite dumbfounded, by the crate they'd just brought up.  
  
"They won't do anything to help you at any rate," he says. "Likely they've worked out that you were going to sell them out for yourself, turn them in and become a local hero. Best we end it now, don't you think?"  
  
"It wasn't like that!" the girl exclaims, but her voice is far too shrill, her tone far too worried. Sherlock loves it when he knows he's right.

 

She meets his eye over the young woman's shrill protest, and flashes him a brief, utterly wicked smile. Hardly the appropriate place or time for it, but the student's plan is slipping away like sand, and watching him take the last few pieces apart, watching her crumble at his words, makes a familiar warm tension pool at the pit of her stomach.  
  
"No? What was it then?" she asks, glancing over at the two porters. "Let me guess, she said she'll split the profits with you two evenly? A third each?" One of the two remains gaping, the other nods hesitantly. "I'd suggest taking those paintings back where you found them. You might still be able to find an idiot to buy them thinking they're genuine."  
  
She turns her attention back to the student, their little mastermind. "Now that we've gotten that out of the way, dear, do be so kind as to free my associate. And then we can have a properly civil talk about you."

 

The men look at each other and back up, back towards the lift. The girl looks devastated. It's _brilliant_. Well worth any concussion they might've caused.  
  
"No, you can't do this!" the girl says.  
  
"I think she just did," Sherlock says. "Now, before these cut off too much circulation, I think the only weapon you brought was your pocketknife." Back pocket, about three years old. Like the men heading towards the lift, she didn't expect any sort of trouble whatsoever.

 

And for a brief moment, Irene considers it a true pity that this holiday would have to end. That with little more than a mobile and a handful of words, she and Sherlock Holmes could lay such devastating waste to a budding criminal, budding lawyer or budding politician's plans. It was absolutely _glorious_.  
  
The young woman moves, reaching for the pocket knife in her back pocket, and Irene tsks. "Give him the knife, dear. Last thing we need is you trying to make some sort of ill-conceived threat with a knife to anyone's back."  
  
A vicious, deadly smile at the other woman. "Because if you wanted to try something foolish like that, I'd have to tear whatever's left to shreds. The law school. The scholarship. Hm, and that boyfriend too, I think. Hard to be a rising politician shackled to a disgraced criminal for a girlfriend, wouldn't you agree?"

 

The girl stares, slack-jawed, at the Woman, and then offers up the knife. Sherlock estimates they have about ten minutes before her shock wears off and she tries for something else or threatens again.  
  
He doesn't bother waiting for the Woman to cut him free before he says, "I'm still driving."

 

Irene plucks the knife from her hand, and kneels by the display. Her eyes never leave the young woman as she slips the knife deftly between his wrist and the plastic tie. It's merely a moment's work to snap the one and press the knife into his hand to finish freeing himself. "Convince me you don't have a concussion first," she counters, rising to her feet again and stepping towards the still-stunned young woman.  
  
She rests a fingertip on the other woman's chin, forcing her head up ever so slightly. "Now dear, you've got two options. You let us walk out of here with your plan in shambles, looking over your shoulder that someone will one day expose your little secret, or you play the hero. You stumbled on a plot by those two idiots with the forged art, trying to replace the art in the museum, were rendered unconscious, and when you came to, you remembered enough of the details to assist in their capture."  
  
She gestures to Sherlock, to herself. "They, of course, spin some wild story about you being the mastermind, that they were told to take the art and run by a man and a woman who stumbled onto your plot. You, of course, insist there were no such people, that they are making up wild stories. You could be the hero of the story, or you could watch over your shoulder for the rest of your life to come crumbling down."  
  
She lets go of the girl's chin, and the young woman sways ever-so-slightly with the lack of contact. "Now which one will it be?"

 

He slices open the other side, and moves to his feet. He's a little off-balance, but nothing that he can't handle, he tells himself. He's certainly not giving up control of the car back to the Woman, not in this case.  
  
The Woman is being far more generous than Sherlock would be, were their positions reversed. He would turn her in as she is, let the police handle the more boring aspects of it, like who her accomplices were. The Woman, conversely, manipulates the girl beautifully, and it leaves Sherlock with very little concern as to what will happen to them. They won't be mentioned again, because it will ruin the lie the girl will fabricate. Ruin it, and they will only appear on the statement of the men later, long after he and the Woman have gone. Mycroft will have nothing to go on, not right away.  
  
"Keys," he tells the girl. "To the cars."

 

The valet blinks rapidly in seeming incomprehension at the demand for the keys, and Irene rolls her eyes, reaching into the valet's pocket and liberating the keys in question.  
  
She scrutinizes the valet, and the satisfied smile grows as the valet-turned-law-student-turned-failed-criminal meets her eye, her expression focusing, realizing there is only one choice in the matter. She nods; it's superficial, Irene has already known exactly which way she would fall. Irene picks up the fallen spanner and steps behind her. The other woman tenses in anticipation, but Irene waits until she relaxes again, confused, before bringing the spanner down hard on the back of the girl's head. Not hard enough to break, to cause any permanent damage, but hard enough to send her boneless to the ground.  
  
Perhaps harder than strictly necessary, but then the Woman was nothing if not vindictive. She tosses the spanner to the side, kicks the unconscious valet's legs out of her way, and arches an eyebrow at Sherlock. She tosses the keys to him in a higher than necessary arc, a little to his left, testing his reflexes.  
  
"Shall we?"

 

The keys go up, and it's higher than he expected. He still catches them, but they do bump off of his palm before his fingers close around them. It's hardly graceful, but it'll do.  
  
"It'll give us about twelve hours before we'll need to change cars again," he says.

 

She watches him fumble, then catch, the keys, and her brows furrow. "We'll leave it at Niagara," she answers. "I'm sure Moran won't mind if we took whatever he's decided to meet us in."  
  
Said lightly, confidently, as if she is certain that Moriarty's mad dog would be amenable to her plans. Ignoring the possibility that he might not and what that would entail for their current holiday. She steps close to Sherlock, her attention fixed on him, and runs a light fingertip along his brow, the pad of her thumb echoing the movement with a similar one along his cheekbone.

 

He can't tell if she's being overconfident, or if she's trying to appear that way for his benefit. He can't help but hope it's genuine overconfidence, because otherwise she'd be insulting him. Then again, overconfidence means she's more likely to get herself into more trouble. Then again, the Woman's favorite pastime is misbehaving.  
  
The touch to his face is intimate, gentle. His fingers tighten around the keys in his hand even as his face moves slightly into the touch. Cautious, but far from stupid. Strange, though. Apart from John, he has never trusted someone as much as he trusts the Woman. He can only wonder how much trouble that will eventually get him into.  
  
"He doesn't seem the sort to take the train," he warns her.

 

"He can take this car."  
  
The way he leans into the touch is reassuring, and the fact that she finds it so is more than a little irritating. Still, her fingers linger longer than necessary, even after she's seen his eyes react to her presence, to movement. She steps away, and heads for the service elevator the valet's accomplices used.  
"You're still not driving."

 

"I had assumed you wanted me to pick a car that you couldn't drive in order to show your faith in me," he says, not even bothering to try to say it with any sort of sincerity.  
  
He steps up beside her next to the lift. "I suppose you wanted to see me attempt to be contrary and give myself no choice but to let you drive."

 

She watches the numbers on the elevator indicator crawl upward, but it's obvious even without looking when he steps up beside her. The shift in air currents, the faint warmth of radiant body heat. The little things that are now as familiar as slipping on a well-worn coat. She gives him a sidelong look.  
  
"You can drive an automatic as easily as a standard," she points out, a smirk at the corner of her mouth. She doesn't bother feigning innocence. "Maybe I just wanted to suggest you choose something with a failsafe."

 

The lift opens and he takes a step inside, brushing past her. He spins around and looks ahead at the unconscious girl and the statue, bright in the middle of the construction area. He tilts his head as he looks at it. He hadn't realized exactly how hideous it was before.  
  
"Art?" he inquires, nodding towards the statue.

 

She follows, leaning against the back wall of the lift. She takes a moment to look at the scene objectively, ignoring the fierce satisfaction she feels at the sight of the unconscious young woman.  
  
"History, I believe." A sidelong look before she leans forward to send the elevator back down to the garage level. "Not up to par for your sense of aesthetics?"

 

He turns to look at the Woman.  
  
"The way you manipulate is an art," he says. "That is just a _thing._ "  
  
To him, this is one of the best compliments he has ever given anyone. There are things worth looking at, worth watching, and the Woman when she is thinking, when she is truly using her brilliant brain, is _beautiful_.

 

Her finger stills on the lift's control panel even as the doors close and the lift begins its ponderous descent. The very real surprise on her face fades to genuine pleasure, as a slow smile tugs at her lips. She expects no one else would understand the depth of that compliment, but she does and it simply makes her smile grow.  
  
She eventually straightens, as if realizing she is giving away too much by the surprise that freezes her fingers lingering against the lift's controls, but the smile remains. "I'm flattered," she murmurs, as if daring him to tell her she shouldn't be. "But then I've always suspected your sense of aesthetics was better than theirs."  
  
'Theirs' in this case meaning practically everyone else in the world.

 

The door to the service elevator opens and Sherlock turns his head, smirking at her.  
  
"Don't be," he says. He leans towards her, only slightly. Just enough to be able to smell her hair, the scent of her skin, and then he pulls back and steps from the lift, heading towards the exit.

 

He leans in just enough to be noticed, just enough to put lie to the words, and she laughs, the sound low and deep in her throat, as she exits the lift. She doesn't speak again until they are at the valet station and its cabinet full of car keys.  
  
"That does prove my point, you realize," she says, gesturing vaguely upward, towards the fourth floor art exhibit and the probably still unconscious woman within.

 

"That one has to try very hard to make Canadian culture interesting?"

 

"That I can't let you out of my sight."

 

He turns to look back at her. This feels like flirting. He has no idea why it feels like flirting, it simply does.  
  
"That fact will make your meeting with Moran particularly interesting."

 

"Then it's a good thing I enjoy interesting," she replies with a smirk, gesturing to the valet's key locker.  
  
The standoff with the student over, Irene allows herself to start feeling the twinge in her leg from the extended activity. The standoff, the bluff with the student, the climb up four flights of stairs. She's nearly willing to let him drive, concussion or no, simply to be able to sit down.  
  
Not that she'd tell _him_ that.

 

He steps over to the box, unlocks it, and takes an incredibly brief glance before grabbing a key.  
  
"Shouldn't have many stairs, unless you'd rather wait down here," he says. Not at all smugly.

 

That earns him a familiar glare as she straightens her spine. "A level up, isn't it?" she retorts. The arrangement of keys in the cabinet had been obvious. "Not the cherry corvette, I hope."

 

"Is it the color or the style that offends you most?" Sherlock asks, not bothering to deny his choice. He starts towards the door, pausing only briefly to see if she's following.

 

She briefly considers ransacking the valet's cabinet again and telling him to meet her at the Falls. Briefly, but it is tempting nonetheless. She follows, letting her irritation wash fully over her rather than weariness.  
  
"The cliché," she answers tartly. "I'll take that to mean you chose it on purpose."

 

"Cliché?" he replies, far too innocently to be genuine. "I had no idea."  
  
Her irritation is more than a little pleasing. He supposes that's unfair, but he can't truly care at the moment. He needs to take little victories when he gets them. He holds the door for her.

 

"If you were actually trying to lie, I'd be offended," she informs him, sweeping through the door he holds open with a regal air even Her Highness might have had trouble rivaling.  
  
She heads for the stairs and gives him a sidelong look, as if to distract from the fact that her hand is firmly on the handrail. Not that she _needed_ it at the moment, but just in case. "She caught you by surprise?"

 

He scowls. "Hardly."  
  
A pause as he shuts the door and catches up to her.  
  
More quietly, he adds, "It won't happen again."

 

She doesn't slow her pace, but she does give him another look, this time less arch, less obviously meant to irritate him.  
  
Her eyes meet his. "Good," she answers, just as quietly.

 

He stuffs his hands into his pockets as they walk. He longs, albeit briefly, for his old coat. To turn up the collars against the wind and feel just the tiniest bit invincible.  
  
"I think the corvette will be a good change for us," he says. "For one reason in particular."

 

Her fingers linger on the handrail as they walk, the touch light enough to almost not be there. Still, she cannot help feeling just the mildest relief when they reach the top of the stairs.  
  
"Oh? You'll have to come up with a better reason than standard transmission."

 

He brushes past her, letting his fingertips just brush hers. Not enough to be a romantic gesture, in his mind, but enough to establish the slightest bit of concerned contact. If he can't deny he _cares_ , so be it. But he can deny he cares _that much._  
  
"After your performance upstairs I'm surprised you haven't worked it out already," he says, offering her the slightest of smirks.

 

She reads concern in the momentary touch of his fingertips against hers, and lets go of the rail in the same gesture. Her steps fall into rhythm with his naturally, almost unthinkingly.  
  
"I indulged you with a performance then," she admonishes, reaching for the door. "Consider this returning the favour."

 

He flips the alarm off of the cherry convertible, and presses a button to lower the top. The interior is a dark leather, and the seats have wide leg room. Most importantly, to Sherlock, is the large back seat. He's not entirely sure what it proves, except that should they need a place to lay down, they can do so.  
  
Or, should she decide to do something as arousing as she had back upstairs, well---it was something to take note of.


	3. The Distance Between Two Points

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having foiled an art theft at the museum, Sherlock and Irene are left to their own devices and there are hours before they have to meet Sebastian Moran...

A slow, pleased smile spreads across her face at his pointed silence, and there is a low, velvet laugh on her tongue when she brushes up against him. "I did only specify that you'd have to wait until we were out of Montreal this morning, didn't I?" she asks, her fingers ghosting across the knuckles of his hand.

 

He turns his hand over to curl his fingers around hers. Their desire for each other can't be normal, but this is not the first time he has thought this.  
  
"And how many hours until you're expected?" he asks.

 

"At least twelve," she answers. There is no denying that her pulse speeds up at their proximity, just as there is no denying the fierce thrill of satisfaction that settles under her skin at the knowledge that the act, her performance with the valet had affected him.   
  
They are extraordinary. It was obvious that their desires would be as well.  
  
Still, her fingers curl with his, warm and solid, and she traps him between her body and the car's chassis. "More like eight, if we wanted to have enough time to properly prepare a welcome for Moran. Another hour and a half to drive..." The fingers of her free hand wander down his forearm, thumb tracing along his wrist, feeling the tension in ligaments as he holds the keys tight.   
  
"Plenty of time, I'd say."

 

"Yes," he replies. "I think we have plenty."  
  
He leans in towards her, brushing his mouth briefly with hers. Desire courses through him and he feels like he's out of control once again. She does this to him and he can't possibly care. Not after everything they've gone through. He doesn't want other people right now, he wants _this_ , with her.  
  
"Yes," he agrees.

 

His lips brush against hers, and though the contact is brief, it is, as all contact between them tends to be, electric, holding in the brief moment all the potential of who and what they are and all the things they have and can do to each other. It sends a jolt of desire skittering down her spine, and the fingers not curled with his twist into his hand, hooking around the keyring to the Corvette's keys.  
  
With a wicked smile on her lips, she leans in and catches his mouth with hers again, all deliberately slow, lazy desire on her tongue, tasting and exploring as her fingers begin prying the keys out of his grip.

 

He returns the kiss, the same slow desire returned. He is momentarily reminded of the photograph of them they found in Las Vegas, the kiss against the car after they had beaten the reporter. They looked like such ordinary lovers then. To the outside observer, he wonders if they do now, too.  
  
His grip tightens on the keyring and he breaks the kiss.  
  
"I'm hardly too enamored to lose my senses," he says, voice low and teasing.

 

Her own grip doesn't slacken when he breaks the kiss. She merely smirks and arches deliberately against him. "If you were, this wouldn't be nearly as much fun," she answers, her own voice low and throaty. "But if you drove, I expect I'll do far better distracting you from the passenger seat than you would."

 

"That sounds like a deliberate attempt at manipulation," he says. "Don't tell me you're _slipping_."  
  
She arches against him, and with his back to the car, he hasn't any way to avoid it. Not that he would, of course. He slips his hand around her waist and pulls her just slightly closer.

 

"And here I thought it sounded like a challenge," she murmurs as he pulls her closer. There had been barely any space between them before, and now she can feel every twitch, every shift of muscle against her body, and she is certain he can do the same.  
  
Her hand, now freed from his, slides up his arm, along his shoulder, as she leans in, rising on her toes, to trace the curve of his ear with her lips. "Telling me you don't enjoy trying to drive me to distraction, Mr. Holmes?"

 

"I think the real question is if I'd prefer that to actually driving," he says. His breath hitches at the sensation of her warm mouth against the curve of his ear, and he turns his head to press his lips just above her eyebrow.  
  
Oh, but he'd love the opportunity to see her lose all her composure. To trace his hand up her leg, to avoid being too obvious with his touches while he deduces every piece of the car's interior. Yes, that would be glorious.  
  
But, then again, _driving_.

 

"Mmm," she practically purrs, shifting her hips to brush deliberately against his front. The feel of his lips against her brow sends warm desire burrowing under her skin, but it is this, the teasing, the challenge, the potential, that make her eyes shine, that make her pupils dilate and her fingers tangle into the hair at the back of his head.  
  
" _I_ think the real question is whether or not you'd be able to drive for very long if you chose to try."

 

He brushes her nose with his. The movement of her hip reminds him that his arousal is practically palpable, which is unreasonably annoying, as it counteracts everything he wants to say.  
  
"I have a remarkable amount of self-control," he says. It's somewhat comical, especially considering the breathiness with which he speaks.  
  
Damn the Woman.

 

"I can see that," she answers with laughter on her tongue as she shifts against him again, her thigh brushing against his erection. She drops a purposely fleeting kiss on his nose, on the exact spot he'd brushed against hers, and tugs at the keys still caught between their grips.  
  
"And I have a remarkable ability to make you lose it. Especially if I have nothing to distract me."

 

He keeps his grip tight on the keys.  
  
"I'm certain you'll find something," he replies. "Beyond diverting me while I'm driving, mind."  
  
Is it improper to have someone in the car park of the museum where you just stopped a crime? Sherlock is beginning to seriously hope not.

 

She laughs, low and long, the sound humming in her throat and against her skin as she leans in again, and traces the curve of his ear with her tongue. She lets go of the car keys and pulls back just far enough to allow her fingers to trail down his chest and run a single fingertip along the front of his trousers.  
  
"I _could_ find something beyond that, but I think that is precisely the diversion I'd prefer."

 

He flicks the keys up and into his palm, and then leans down to press his mouth to hers. Yes, yes. A place where they can be diverting to each other is an excellent idea. He'll simply have to lose the use of his left hand while he grips onto the keys. He knows her, she'll pry them away at any opportunity.  
  
There's the screeching sound of tires somewhere behind them. Even as he kisses the Woman, he recognizes the sound of a van. Ten years old, damage to the axle.

 

Her laugh is swallowed up by his kiss, and Irene recognizes the sound of the keys jingling as he closes his hand around them, as if knowing she'd take them back at the first opportunity. That laugh too, becomes lazy exploration as the sound of squealing tires worms its way into her consciousness.   
  
"Perhaps not the best place for this," she murmurs, "Unless you prefer being arrested for public indecency in very short order."

 

"It's becoming dangerous," he says, without any reference or preamble.

 

Her fingers linger along his front, now deliberately avoiding his obvious state of arousal but leaving feather-light touches as close as possible, trailing along his inner thigh. "Is it? What happened to your remarkable amount of self-control, Mr. Holmes?"

 

He doesn't smile. What he says is utterly sincere but, to him, completely devastating.  
  
"You destroy my self control completely, Woman."

 

There is a heaviness, a weight of inescapable truth in his words that requires a response that is more than playful desire, more than teasing and frustration. Her hand rests on his hip, and she does not move, does not shift against him or step away, aware of how very closely she is pressed against him, how very completely they have tangled themselves in each other.  
  
"And you've uncovered every secret I'd had when Irene Adler was still alive. And I expect you'll try for every one since. I think we left 'dangerous' behind a long time ago."

 

He had said to her once that love was a dangerous disadvantage. How true of them, with their still-healing wounds and misplaced plans. Logic dictates that he should disengage from her. That he should fear the hold she has on him, and doubt the trust he continues to place in her. There is only one person that Sherlock should trust, and that should be himself. (John Watson notwithstanding.)  
  
After all, the pain he felt when he found out she had betrayed him back in London, with Mycroft, was nothing to the pain he might feel should she betray him now.  
  
"Back in Kotor," he finds himself saying. "I imagine."   
  
He pauses. "I still don't love you." It's suddenly somewhat bothersome that he believes this is true. It's entirely likely that what he feels for her is as close to love as he can get, which is a stark reminder that there could be something very wrong with him.

 

"Love is a dangerous disadvantage, you proved it once," she says wryly. "I won't love you."   
  
As if there is a choice, as if the way they have entangled themselves in each other is something that can be shut off, ignored. It was an utter lie, but then she excelled at lies, even here, with them pressed close against each other, with their respective injuries, with the knowledge that she'd concussed the valet upstairs far harder than strictly necessary simply because the chit had done the same to him.  
  
As if she could choose to simply walk away from him at this singular moment.   
  
Lies, but then perhaps they both need the lie.  
  
"This is an anomaly, a blip in the circuitry, as you might say."

 

"Yes," he agrees. "That's exactly what this is."  
  
His lip twitches upwards at her use of the word _won't_ as opposed to _don't._ A minor change, just one letter, one sound, and yet it is what defines the two of them as different while so much is similar. She makes the choice to not want to love him, he is often compelled by the knowledge that he may not actually be able to.  
  
Strange, how well they continue to fit, pressed against each other and this expensive car that they don't even pretend to own.  
  
"Shall we remain within the blip long enough to use this car to its fullest potential?" he asks, raising an eyebrow.

 

Her lips quirk into a smile in response, and she slides her hand at his hip back up towards his wrist, towards the hand that still holds the car keys. There is no question what her answer is, not in the way her eyes are dilated, not in the way her pulse races, or the way her skin flushes. There is no question to the answer, not when she is utterly betrayed by chemistry.  
  
But she makes the choice yet, despite the obvious answer. "That depends on what your definition of its fullest potential is."

 

The noise that comes out of his throat is low, just short of an aroused growl. He's more than a little surprised by it, actually, as he's not certain he's made a noise quite so frustrated and yet pleased sounding before. His own arousal is as obvious, not just from his dilated eyes and breath, but from his hip pressed against hers.  
  
" _Twice_ ," he says.

 

She presses her mouth to his again, swallowing both her own budding laugh and his low growl in the single motion. The slow lazy exploration of before is gone, replaced by alternating aggression and teasing, deepening the kiss _just_ enough to be breathless and then pulling back.  
  
Her grip on his wrist tightens, slim fingers like iron before she lets go again and steps back. She takes a step towards the passenger seat, the hand that had been in his hair now dragging a bright red tipped nail against the cherry red paint of the car. "Then you might want to start driving."  
  
The 'unless you've changed your mind' goes unspoken, but not unexpressed.

 

Oh, she is maddening. However, something very like victory crosses his face as he moves to unlock the car doors. Yes, he has to adjust himself as subtly as possible in order to sit, but it's worth it.  
  
He starts the car. It hums happily, having been ignored for far too long. Not that he honestly puts any sort of persona into non-living things, but he could see this car being significantly happier with a long drive. He's doing it a favor by stealing it.  
  
"Do strap in," he says, pulling the car back out of its spot.

 

She slips into the passenger seat with liquid grace, her hand running across the fine leather approvingly as she does. She smirks, however, at his attempt to subtly adjust himself, and instead of strapping in as he suggests, she rests a hand on his knee, the gesture almost painfully innocent. She purrs, just barely over the engine,  
  
"Drive."


	4. Cruise Control (Rated E)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The intellectual high of a foiled crime and the particular brand of challenge Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes incite in each other come to a head on a stretch of Canadian highway.

"And how well do you think I'll take to orders, Woman?" he replies. Of course, the moment the car straightens, he peels out of the lot, pleased at the pickup in first gear and the smoothness of transition into second. He idly wonders exactly how many kph he could get to before even hitting fourth, but decides not to bother until they're on the open road.  
  
Her hand on his leg is distracting in all of the right ways. Distracting because of how innocent it could be but _isn't_ , like everything she does. From the change of his text alert noise to her sleeping in his bed. No, there is very little innocent about the Woman, and that is how he prefers her.

 

"You're taking that one admirably," she answers smugly. A part of her thinks the way he is driving that strapping in would actually be far more expedient, far safer than not, but at the moment she could care less.  
  
Her fingernail traces along the inside of his knee, curls and circles and meaningless, senseless sigils. Nothing that would give away anything yet, at the moment. Her tone is conversational, despite the pleasure in her voice.  
  
"We have Moran trapped, you realize. He knew if he hunted down your friends in retaliation for your dismantling Jim's network, you'd come after him. And after London, he knows in no uncertain terms that if he hunted you down, he'd be penniless within days, that the rest of the network he relies on will collapse, that going to ground is no guarantee that he'd survive. And then he'd still have to hide from me."

 

"You're forgetting the important thing," he says. "Sentiment. We don't know Moran's attachment to Jim, and for all we know, they could've been quite close. I wouldn't stop at anything to enact revenge if someone killed John."  
  
Or her, he thinks, though it's in an entirely different way. He feels something pleased bubble in his chest at the knowledge that the Woman would go after Moran should he die. Something like pleasure, but warmer. Then, of course, her fingers are tracing the inside of his leg, and all of his nerve endings are reminding him of how very good that feels.

 

"No, but he's had plenty of opportunity," she points out. "Hong Kong. London. San Salvador. He could have had his revenge at any time, but he hasn't."  
  
Her fingers continue tracing along his inner thigh, no longer content to remain at his knee. Curls and circles becoming looping lines, signatures. _Alissa Carrington. Arturo Bernaldi. Irene Norton. Angelique. Anthea Holmes._  
  
All the various aliases she'd used since their particular holiday began, writ against his skin.  
  
"Suggests he's being driven by survival as much as sentiment, by this point. Realizing sentiment only goes so far, that he's far more fond of continued existence than revenge."

 

He recognizes the movement of her fingers when she gets to _Irene_. Her signatures, loopy and swift, distracting and diverting. He tries to focus on the road and the conversation, rather than sensation.  
  
"Suggests, but doesn't support," he says. "He could be a very dangerous wild card, Woman. If he's anything like Jim, he doesn't mind playing the Long Game."

 

"He didn't take the shot in San Salvador, he could have but he didn't. Seems to support the idea that he's at least interested."  
  
Her smile grows when he realizes what she's tracing along his thigh, and one fingertip ghosts upward to brush up against his arousal. A barely there touch, so brief as to be almost accidental. As if he'd believe anything she did to be accidental.  
  
She tucks her feet beneath her in the seat and leans up, her lips close to his ear again. "And he isn't the only one who can play the long game."

 

What he wouldn't give for a set of eyes that could look out the windshield while he kissed her. She distracted beautifully, pulled him out of his important thoughts perfectly.  
  
"No," he agrees. "This is a game you've been playing for quite a while, now."  
  
He turns onto Kingston Street. There must be somewhere he can pull over. Eliminate some distraction.

 

The tension that's shot through him is obvious, and Irene laughs quietly as her lips trace along his jaw to the curve of his neck. She leaves a lingering kiss there, with the light scrape of teeth, one hand still lingering along his thigh, the other gripping the back of the seat.  
  
 _I would have you right here until you begged for mercy._  
  
The fact that she lines the words along his leg in script rather than Morse code is perhaps a sign of how distracted she herself is, or maybe it simply allows her to stimulate more nerves with barely there touches.  
  
"I think I've done better than just _play_ , Mr. Holmes."

 

"Yes," Sherlock says. "I doubt you've ever simply _played_ , Woman."  
  
He pulls across an intersection, and then across another lot before pulling into an empty car park.  
  
"Apart from that bit with the handcuffs in London."

 

"Even then I think I made a point," she purrs. As if to make another one, she runs her thumb slowly along the full length of his arousal before pulling back, hand resting almost innocently on the armrest between them.  
  
She draws back, leaving a precise 2.5 centimeters between them, and her eyes are dark and dilated even as she looks around the empty car park. "Three blocks before you stopped, was it?"

 

Two blocks, actually, but he won't admit it aloud to her.

  
He turns and sets the car back into first gear.  
  
"You're right. I can always go a bit farther, if you'd like."

 

He sets the car back into first gear, and as he does a devious smile crosses her face. With one hand braced on the armrest, she reaches across him, and in a movement that sends a momentary twinge down her leg, she moves across the armrest and the console until she's straddling him. A part of her mind is grateful for the fact that his height meant the driver's seat had been pushed back to its limit, but most of her is simply smug.  
  
"I'd like to see you try," she says.

 

He looks up at her, somewhat stunned by her audacity. Her audacity, and the fact that she's currently straddling him, pressing herself against his arousal. She's quite content to make certain that they get nowhere fast. But then again, it _is_ a holiday.  
  
"Never one to turn down a challenge."  
  
He lowers his left leg, resetting the car into first gear, and pushes down on the pedal. The car roars back to life, and he peers over her shoulder to drive, spinning once while he pulls them towards the exit of the car park

 

The fact that he's _actually_ trying surprises her for a moment, but she supposes it shouldn't. They did, after all, have a tendency to drive each other to lengths no one else could, and this was simply another aspect of it, another way to show off.  
  
The reckless danger of it is thrilling, even as her fingers dig into his shoulder when the car begins to move. "No, you're not," she agrees, that same devious smile still on her lips as she shifts her hips, grinding deliberately against him.

 

He lets out an involuntary sound at the motion of her hips against his, and he puts the car into second as he pulls out sharply onto the road. He could, in all honesty, care less about the looks he's certain they're acquiring from other drivers. This is a challenge, and he imagines his arousal is partially her ministrations, and partially that challenge.  
  
"The question is how far before you ask me to pull over," he says.

 

The noise he makes at the shift of her hips against him deepens her smile, though the fact that he pulls out into the road causes her hand to grip his uninjured shoulder tighter, though she would insist it was only fractional.  
  
A man, his hair shaved close to his head, driving an unremarkable secondhand sedan, gives them a startled look, as they pass, but Irene could care less at the moment, as reckless abandon and the thrill of adrenaline sing with the challenge in her veins. The hand not gripping his shoulder slides along his front, and she undoes a single button on his shirtfront.   
  
"I think you'll pull over on your own first."

 

"Oh? Will I?"  
  
He turns rather sharply onto the highway, a long stretch of road that leads out of the city. He can see quite well over her shoulder, but she is unbelievably distracting. Her long fingers undoing the buttons on his shirt, the way she moves against him.  
  
He can't let go of the shift just yet, but he can lift his hips marginally, against where she's straddling him.

 

He moves against her, just barely, and the motion highlights exactly how much more space she has to maneuver than he does, though the small motion is enough to remind her just how much _more_ interesting things could be if he weren't quite so insistent on driving.  
  
She matches his motion, her own more deliberate, more thorough, as her fingers linger on his chest, curling around another button. "Mmm, I _do_ have far better leverage."

 

"Yes," he agrees. "Physically. But I'm still the one driving."  
  
He puts the car in fifth gear and releases the shift, moving his hand to her hip.

 

She gasps as he shifts into fifth gear, as the Corvette hums and gathers speed, and her grip tightens again. The fact that she can't _see_ where they're going, only where they've been, only highlights the amount of trust in play, the amount of control she's already relinquished in playing this game.  
  
Still, his hand is warm against her hip, and she undoes another button on his shirt, tracing a nail along his sternum, lingering against the healing IV scar from his forced hospitalization in Las Vegas. "Trying to scare me into asking you to stop?"

 

"Admitting that you're scared, Woman?"

 

"Hardly."  
  
She leans in close deliberately, never quite actually blocking his view of the road, and kisses his neck again, sucking hard enough against the thin skin there to leave a mark. "Though I do seem to be trusting you not to get us killed."

 

She sucks on his neck and it hurts in the most pleasant of ways. He lets out a short gasp, and passes yet another empty parking lot as he speeds up the car to make it onto the interstate. He won't let her win, he tells himself. He won't.  
  
"Trust is a very dangerous thing, Woman," he warns her. At the same time, however, he's trusting her not to do anything too reckless, not to get them killed. He raises a hand to her breast.

 

The hand not gripping the seat back stops lingering along his chest, and catches his wrist in a firm grip, deliberately keeping his hand from her breast.   
  
"You wanted to drive," she reminds him, breath warm against his neck. "Not play."

 

"Are you implying I'm incapable of multitasking?" he asks with a smirk. "Would you rather I _stop_?"

 

She pulls his hand away from her and back towards the steering wheel. "Not at all. Just holding you to precisely what you wanted to do, Mr. Holmes," she answers with a laugh and another lingering kiss at his throat.  
  
There's challenge and steel in her voice when she speaks again, shifting her hips against his as she does.   
  
"So drive."

 

He looks out to the road. This stretch of Canadian road is fairly long and straight with a slight turn about forty seconds up. Two other cars. He deduces where he thinks they will go in the next few minutes.  
  
He breaks his gaze from the road and turns it to the Woman. After all, if she isn't going to let him fight back in one way, he'll figure out another. She shifts against him, and he doesn't bother hiding his reaction to it, letting his eyes shut momentarily before returning his gaze to her.

 

In any other circumstance, drawing that obvious a reaction from him would have been a victory. But he closes his eyes and the car is still moving fast enough that she involuntarily starts, and immediately purses her lips when she realizes what had occurred. She twists in his lap, taking a look ahead at the road that was, for the moment, straight enough to risk what he had just done. But there is a bend ahead, and an entrance to the interstate that likely would bring more traffic. Her brow furrows, and she meets his eye for a brief moment.   
  
"Car behind us, to your right" she says, forcing her voice to conversational calm despite the breathlessness she cannot completely hide. She releases her grip on his wrist, trailing fingertips along his arm and down his front until she's at his waistband. Space is tight, but there is no missing her intent as she tugs at the button. "Clearly used for commuting. Woman inside talking on a hands-free device. Tell me who she's talking to."

 

He chances a brief glance at the car, at the woman on the phone. The furrow in her brow, the way she taps on the steering wheel.  
  
"Sister," he says. "They're talking about something that upsets her, and she's counting in her head in order to make certain she doesn't go off on her. Could be a boyfriend or a lover, but there's no sentimental garb on her, no wedding band, no jewelry. She's got a dangly placard under her rearview mirror that proclaims that 'sisters are friends you don't choose', or some such nonsense, which makes sister practically the only choice."  
  
Her hand goes to his waistband and he looks back up at her, his eyes dark. The bend in the road is about to start, and he's going far too fast to be entirely certain that things are clear. How long can he go before he looks? Five seconds. Six. Seven.

 

There is no doubt in her mind that her own eyes mirror his, dark and surrounded with pale rings of colour. Pulse elevated, pupils dilated. She hums in approval at his response, undoing the button on his trousers and inching the zipper slowly down, half teasing, half necessity, given the confines of their positions.  
  
"The dog, I expect," she continues, the conversation utterly at odds with what she's doing. "Dog toy lodged under the rear windshield and the backseat, but old, disused. And the decal on the windshield."  
  
A signpost she'd noticed as near the curve in the road during her peek towards the road ahead whizzes by behind as she shifts again, gaining enough space to fully unzip his trousers and run a finger along his boxers.

 

"Well spotted."  
  
As she peeks at the road ahead, he continues to look at her, refusing to give away anything. His arousal is telling, but he won't admit it if he wants to look at the road.  
  
This, he thinks, is why he needs John Watson. Although John would be extremely uncomfortable in a situation like this, he would be there, telling Sherlock to knock it off and pull off to the side of the road if they were going to be getting up to this.

 

"I could say the same. I'm impressed."  
  
He remains watching her, and adrenaline and desire buzz under her skin, settling warm and wanting at the base of her spine. This is, among other things, what makes them extraordinary, what makes them exactly who they are and makes _this_ so much more interesting than mere lovers would.   
  
"Though I'd say you've lost, Mr. Holmes. You're hardly _driving_ at this juncture."

 

He raises an eyebrow. "Not fast enough for you?"  
  
He pushes his foot down on the pedal.

 

A sharp, indrawn breath and her hand grips the leather seatback harder.   
  
"Speed isn't everything," she answers, sliding her hand into his boxers and ringing her thumb and forefinger around his arousal. She smirks as she strokes the entire length of his erection in one deliberate motion. "Reactions matter."

 

He can't let her win. He can't let her win.  
  
All the same, he can't possibly concentrate. Her hand is circling his erection and stroking. He can't concentrate, and he has the voice of John Watson buzzing in his mind that he was _being reckless_ and _going to get the both of you killed_ and---and---  
  
He turns his head sharply to the right and cuts the car across two lanes of traffic to the shoulder of the road, where he grips the emergency brake, sliding the car to a sharp halt. He moves that hand back around her waist, and pulls her close.  
  
"Not a word out of you," he murmurs, before moving to capture her mouth with his.


	5. To the Finish Line (Rated E)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Intellectual synchronicity and sentiment draw Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler into the trap of sexuality, but just how far do they trust each other?

The car spins to a stop, and her back hits the steering wheel before his arm is around her waist and pulling her close again. She wants to contradict him, because it is what they _do_ , but at the moment, with his mouth heated and demanding against hers, Irene isn't certain she _could_ manage a word even if she tried.   
  
The sharp pain of the blow at her back, the game and the challenge that arouses them both, and the knowledge that he'd given in before she had is heady beyond belief, and she kisses him back with abandon, the hand that had been gripping the seat back sliding into his hair. Without the worry of the speeding car, she strokes him again, pressing her body against his as she deepens the kiss and swallows back a moan.

 

She's wearing far too many clothes at the moment, in Sherlock's opinion. He's already lost, so demanding what he wants rather than denying himself is completely allowed at this point. He traces his hand back up her front, touching her breast while his other hand goes to her hip to encourage her closeness.  
  
He takes in a gasp as she strokes him again.  
  
"If this is what sexual desire is like for most," he murmurs against her mouth. "It's a wonder anyone gets anything done."

 

His palm warm against her breast reminds Irene just what an absolutely excellent choice the button front shirt-dress she'd chosen after the male disguise was. She swallows his gasp with a smile, and nips at his lower lip as he murmurs against her mouth.   
  
Another stroke along the length of him, and she shifts in his lap, the movement hiking her dress up an inch, revealing the same garters and stockings he'd helped her with hours ago. "I'd hardly allow you to be as dull as most," she answers.

 

"Dullness isn't something _you_ like," he says.  
  
He allows himself another gasp, and his eyes move down to the garters up her thigh. He smiles at the memory, at the tension they'd shared in the hotel room. Little really would get done if they continued in this vein, but pausing for a moment, well, that would hardly be a problem.  
  
He lets his hand move up her thigh to lift her dress up, out of the way. He'd rather have her completely undressed, he realizes, and while that's rather illogical, he decides he'll work his way there. He starts undoing the buttons at the bottom of her hem, slowly working his way up.

 

A stolen convertible sports car along the side of the road is hardly the most logical place for entanglement and sexual liaisons. But on the other hand, that is part of the thrill, and theirs is a mutual teasing, mutual challenge that hardly cared about things like propriety or legal ramifications.   
  
She all but writhes at the feel of his hand against her thigh, and nearly growls with frustration when his attention turns to the row of small buttons at the hem, as if intending to undo her with complete and utter deliberation. It would almost be irritating, if she couldn't return the favour, couldn't shift closer and finish unbuttoning his shirt in the same fashion.  
  
"And I expect you think you've worked out what I like?" she asks, breathless, as she moves against him, the shift pushing up the skirt hem higher, shifting the light, disposable mobile in her pocket, working it outward. Not that she cares, at the moment, running a long fingernail along his chest with every inch of bared skin exposed as she undid the last of his shirt's buttons.

 

"I think you'd like me to deduce what you like," he says, glancing down at where her finger traces up his chest. Sex itself isn't hardly as fascinating or diverting as this, what they're doing together here.  
  
Teasing. Testing. Tempting.  
  
He undoes another button, and another, slowly undoing the dress and revealing skin. He lowers his hand from her breast down to the skin, touching the skin of her inner thigh, of her hip. He hears a thud on the floor of the car, but ignores it.

 

"You're implying you haven't already," she points out with the barest hint of approval, the touch of his hand against her skin like a brand, lingering on her inner thigh, moving up to her hip. She breathes in sharply, her hand tightening in his hair, as his thumb runs along the junction between her hip and thigh.   
  
She presses her mouth to his, to forestall any gasp he would otherwise manage to draw from her, and a part of her recognizes that this is how they are best themselves, how she prefers to undo him from top down, and he works his way up. The hand that had stroked him lingers at his chest, pushing the unbuttoned shirt away from his shoulder as she deepens the kiss, tasting the faint bitter bite of cigarettes and warm desire on his tongue, murmuring against his lips.  
  
"How much longer will your deductions take, Mr. Holmes?"

 

"Feeling impatient, Woman?" he purrs as she strokes him. He would have her right now, like this, except it would mean the end of the teasing, and part of him loves this bit the best. He traces his thumb across her hip again, and begins murmuring the different types of lotions she's used, the place she purchased her dress, and how he knows these things.  
  
To another couple, the quiet murmurs would've been desperate proclamations of love. For him, it's showing her what his brain can do.

 

"Hardly, I'm just curious how much data you really need," she answers with a scoff, though the effect is lessened somewhat when the scoff melts into a hum of approval as he traces his thumb along her hip again. The hand not curled tight in his hair eases the collar of his shirt away from his shoulder, then traces a path down his front, alternating between light fingertips and the scratch of fingernails until she wraps her fingers around the length of his erection and strokes him again.  
  
Only then does she realize what he's saying, what he is murmuring against her skin, and that realization sends desire roiling through her veins like fire. Intellectual delight intensifies physical touch, and she tosses her head back, arching into him with a breathless sigh of pleasure far more intense than any that had ever come from his mobile phone.

 

Her moan of pleasure exemplifies _her_ , shows her desires parallel his far more than anyone else on the planet's might. He lifts his hips as she tosses back her head, and he wants her, he wants her desperately. What they have is far better than mere desire. It is an intellectual syncing that he has never experienced before.  
  
Her fingers are wrapped around the length of him, and he moves into her touch again, but it's not enough.  
  
"Don't make me beg," he murmurs at the end of his short monologue. "Woman. Please."

 

She presses her mouth to his, and swallows his words with a kiss, catching his lower lip between her teeth. She strokes him slowly, the pad of her thumb running along thin, sensitive skin, tracing the line of a pulsing vein. And as she does, she murmurs back in kind, enumerating every way she's touched him that makes him gasp, every teasing note and every look, all the things she's worked out that he _likes_.  
  
Still, her voice is breathless and ragged as she answers him, as she frees the hand that is curled in his hair just long enough to tear the lace of her knickers, to rip them away without moving from where she is pressed against him.   
  
"Likes to be made to beg," she says at the end of her own very long and detailed list, her fingers having nearly finished stroking the length of him. She moves, lifts her hips and guides him close, deliberate and teasing. Her thumb teases her clitoris and she shivers against him as she practically purrs, "Say please again."

 

Were he the sort to believe in something as silly as magic, he would find the way her brain works to be _magical._ A hybrid of deductive reasoning and the complicated world of desire, she knows him and knows what he likes perfectly, and the way she deduces him is so utterly _perfect_ that it's a bit magical that he doesn't orgasm from her words alone. Her thumb traces up his length and he lets out a sharp gasp, his body arching upwards again.  
  
And he does like to be made to beg. He doesn't like admitting it, he doesn't like _losing_. But she demands, and he finds himself responding without thought.  
  
" _Please_ ," he says, voice breathless with wanting.

 

The single word, breathless and wanting, pools in the pit of her stomach and beneath her skin like liquid desire. This is why she is caught in his orbit; it isn't simply misbehaviour, isn't just the joy of being Irene Adler again, but it is this, it is moments of challenge and rare submission, it is desire in intellect and the crystalline knowledge that there is someone who _understands_ that has caught her, that is as surely a collar around her throat as the handcuffs she'd once placed on his wrists.  
  
She sighs again with obvious and unfeigned, unchecked pleasure as she eases herself onto him, heated and slick with arousal. It doesn't matter at this moment that they are sitting in the driver's seat of a stolen sports car on the side of a Canadian road, that her dress is hiked up high around her hips and the front is fully open. She moves against him, driving with a steady rhythm, as she bends to his shoulder, to leave another lingering, bruising kiss against the familiar curve.

 

He lets out a moan, not bothering to hide his pleasure. Distractions, diversions, desire. She is all these things and all of the things that make a Woman. He moves his hand downwards again, moving his thumb over her clitoris in a slow rhythm opposite that of her movements against him.  
  
"You have made me beg," he breathes, pressing his mouth against her throat. "How else would you like to _claim_ me, Woman?"

 

She gasps in counterpoint to his moan, but the sound melts into her own moan of pleasure and desire at the touch of his thumb against sensitive, receptive nerves coupled with his question. There was no doubt in her mind that he was a quick study, that in the few months they have traipsed around the world that he's learned her body as well as any instrument.   
  
But there is also no question that it was more than learned skill that made her writhe now, that drew the hoarse, breathless cry from her throat, that it is the perfect connection of mind and body, of the physical stimulation of his thumb against her clitoris and his words of challenge murmured against her skin, that threatens to push her over the edge.  
  
Her fingers tighten in his hair, her nails against his scalp, as she throws her head back again, exposing more of her throat to his lips. "I've had you bound. On your knees. Whipped." She moves against him with every word, clenching tight around him as she does. "Mmm, begging for mercy." She pulls away just far enough to give him the thinnest, sharpest of smiles, though the effect is undeniably ruined by the desire that dilates her pupils, that gives her a lush, heavily lidded look.   
  
"You'll call me Mistress yet."

 

She tightens around him, and he lifts his hips to move deeper within her. Right now, under such physical stimulation, the idea of calling her 'Mistress' doesn't sound amiss at all, but it would be giving her a lot of power. A lot more power than he thinks he wants to give her.  
  
"You'd have to earn that title, Woman," he says, leaning forward to press his mouth to her neck again.  
  
She had, after all, long since earned the title of 'Woman' in his mind.

 

The obvious challenge and the touch of his mouth against her throat brings her to a sudden, unexpected climax that leaves her utterly breathless, her body shaking with its intensity. She finds her free hand grasping his side, nails digging into his skin as she rides out her orgasm, still moving rhythmically even as she shudders around him.   
  
She tugs at his hair, pulling his far too talented tongue and lips away from her neck, and rests her forehead against his.   
  
"Is that a challenge, Mr. Holmes?"

 

She climaxes around him, hot and tight and shaking with pleasure. Then, her hand is in his hair, pulling his head back, sending sharp pain down his spine. He thrusts up into her again, holding onto the barest threads of stamina even as his body longs for climax.  
  
"I think we both know that it is, Woman," he replies, giving her a smile.

 

She smiles back, and a part of her thinks how like them that this is their intimacy, this unconventional moment that is still perfectly, logically _theirs_ in a way that defies understanding.   
  
"Good," she says as she crushes her mouth to his, her lips and tongue quick and demanding as her hips urge him on to a quicker rhythm, to the climax she knows he is perilously close to.   
  
She manages to speak once more against his mouth as every movement sends another echo of pleasure rippling through her. "Now, Mr. Holmes."

 

He kisses her back desperately, as though she is air and he's drowning here in the car, on a Canadian highway. His one hand works against her clitoris and his other goes around her waist to hold her, keep her there. It is times like these that he can't even see the possibility of returning to London, returning to the way things were, not when they have this.  
  
Her instruction comes against his mouth, and he complies immediately, crying out against her lips as he orgasms blindingly.  
  
His body shakes as he settles himself, and he looks up at her with wide, dark eyes. He's not one to label such things, but that may have been the most intense orgasm he's experienced. Not that she'd need _that_ sort of an ego boost, he imagines.

 

She swallows his cry with another kiss as he shudders beneath her, and warmth settles under her skin at his obedience which, coupled with his nimble fingers against her clitoris, sends another wave of breathless sensation down her spine, too intense to simply be dismissed as an aftershock.  
  
She leans back against the steering wheel, boneless with pleasure, ostensibly to watch him though it is obvious that she needs to catch her breath as much as he does.   
  
"Maybe I should let you drive more often."

 

"I have been suggesting this," he agrees, giving her a slow, satiated smile. Eventually, he imagines, their tendencies towards dangerous liaisons (and, apparent inability to use protection sexually) will end them in serious trouble. All the same. He'd worry about that later. He lazily lowers his arm down to the floor of the passenger seat, picking up the phone she'd dropped there.  
  
"You must have been distracted," he says, holding it up with a small smile.

 

"You weren't convincing before," she dismisses, her own smile languorous and satisfied despite her dismissive words. Her fingertips linger against his chest, drawing idle loops and tracing the motion of muscle beneath his skin as he moves.   
  
At the sight of the phone, her hand reaches for the pocket of the undone dress, knowing already that it would be empty. "Consider it a compliment," she answers, holding out her hand for it.

 

He presses the open button on the phone, and it requests a password. Of course it does.  
  
"Burner phone," he says. "Four digit pass-code. Significantly less easy to deduce, and I imagine you've learned your lesson from our last encounter with phones."  
  
Considering their last encounter, and the fact that he is still fairly comfortable (if a little sticky) with her on top of him, he doesn't consider really focusing on the phone. Still, he has it in his grasp, he tries once. He punches in the only section of numbers he knows she's used before. _1058._ He remembers the smug look on her face when he'd realized he'd been had, so long ago back in London. He expects the same sort of reaction when the number doesn't work this time.  
  
Except it does. Her text messages are open in front of him, suddenly. Messages to the phone Sherlock had stolen back in the museum. Ticket confirmation text messages.

 

She doesn't expect him succeed.  
  
She expects him to try, once, but she doesn't expect him to succeed. Not with the relative anonymity of the phone, the newness of it would have kept minute wear from showing hints of the pass-code, the code itself, set to something easy to remember, an insignificant string of numbers from a long ago memory.   
  
But the beep of acceptance surprises her, and she tenses minutely against him as he begins scrolling through the contents.  
  
"I think you've proven your point," she says, realizing there's no way he'd leave it to her now, and reaches over to grab it out of his hand.

 

He opens the text, looking at the dates and times of her planned departure. His eyes scan over the information quickly, and before the phone is snatched out of his hand, he catches the number of passengers.  
  
One.  
  
"Yes," he says. "I have."  
  
He would normally be full of wit, but right now he's simply trying to understand what his newfound information means. Everything seems to come together to say that she's leaving. Leaving without him. Leaving for Moscow. Where she knows he's sent his information about Moriarty's web.  
  
Something cold settles in his chest. She's betraying him.


	6. To Win and to Lose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Does a single plane ticket to Moscow signal a betrayal or is it simply a necessary precaution? Will Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler face the truth they are both too stubborn to accept, or will their pride keep them apart for good?

She snatches the phone back, and a quick glance at the screen tells her exactly what he's seen. Her contingency plan. It isn't the first one she's planned since their holiday, though it is the first one she's expected she might need. Irene shoves the phone back into her pocket, and moves to pull away from him, with every intention of vaulting out of the driver's seat and walking back over to the passenger's side rather than climbing over the console again.  
  
A car speeds by as she does, and the occupant wolf-whistles at her obvious state of undress. She ignores it, ignores his obvious surprise. Ignores the small bubble of guilt worming its way through the glow of satisfaction as she climbs out of the car.

 

Sherlock, meanwhile, doesn't bother straightening his clothes at first. He does pull his pants up and zip up his trousers, but leaves his shirt mostly undone. There's no point in dressing, even when one is angry at someone else. And right now, he feels angry. Betrayed.  
  
He wants to ask her why, but part of him knows the response will end something like the last time he had "a number of questions". She was done with him, then. Perhaps she's done with him now.  
  
"I need to reorient myself," he says. "And we can begin driving."

 

Her feet hit the asphalt, and Irene is irritated to realize her knees are weak, that the cramped quarters of the driver's seat had stiffened her leg to an irritable degree. She forces herself to hold herself straight, to refuse to betray another moment of physical weakness, as she crosses the front of the car to the passenger's side door. She keeps her back to him, does not lean against the car, as she finishes doing up the buttons of her dress.  
  
Her bare thighs are faintly sticky, a sensation that will only grow worse until she has a moment to properly clean up, but that's hardly a concern at the moment.   
  
"Nothing's stopping you from leaving now," she says, her back still towards him, still not touching the car despite being very close, as if emphasizing that he could in fact drive away at that very moment, or that she could walk away.  
  
Not that she could go very far in her state, but there were other cars on the road and, judging by the driver who had wolf-whistled, plenty of opportunity for her to coerce her way into another.

 

He keeps his eyes forward, orienting road with the maps he'd looked at on their drive this far. Yes, he can find his way back to the intended route. He can keep his mind on the road rather than on feelings. Caring is not an advantage.  
  
"I believe you are the resident expert at leaving without warning," he says, his words with an edge he hadn't planned on.

 

She stretches discreetly, though she expects he would not notice, not the way they are currently refusing to look at each other, the way they are pointedly ignoring each other without actually doing so. The movement brings with it pain, a twinge, and momentary relief, and Irene acknowledges that climbing back into the passenger seat will in fact only worsen the recovering wound's feelings of fatigue.  
  
"Hypocritical as always," she snipes back, opening the door and climbing into the back seat instead. There is enough space there to stretch out, and she plans on using it fully. "If I recall correctly, you were the one who pressed for a plan, should Moran refuse."

 

"And you've done precisely that," Sherlock says. "Though I didn't imagine that it would be a race to the information I have about Moriarty's web."  
  
Her to get it, him to destroy it. He should simply have memorized the map and destroyed it the moment the Woman became involved in this. But _trust_. Caring. Not an advantage.  
  
"Unless you were rather certain I wouldn't leave this meeting with Moran alive."  
  
The moment the back door is shut, Sherlock starts the car and speeds out onto the roadway, not even bothering to fasten his own lap belt.

 

"I was certain you wouldn't leave _reasonable_ should he refuse," she retorts, wincing as the sudden acceleration presses her back into the seat. She stretches out, the deeply set backseat providing a surprising amount of protection from the elements buffeting the car.  
  
"Just like you're unreasonable now, twisting your _deductions_ to suit a fantasy."

 

He lets out a sharp, rueful laugh.  
  
"You may know what I like, Woman, but you do _not_ understand my deductions."

 

She laughs in response, cold and biting.   
  
"Then explain exactly what led you to the conclusion that I didn't expect you to leave the meeting with Moran alive."

 

"One of several theories, Woman," Sherlock replies. His mind is _reeling_. He's trusted her too much. This has been obvious. He's become far too attached. This...all of this, this is just a sign of how far he's gone.  
  
"Did you suddenly have a desire to part ways, then? Another, very viable option, of course. I do have a number of people within Jim's web to take care of over in Japan while you search out an entire city trying to find one map."

 

"The Baltschug Kempinski," she does not resist retorting. The hotel he had named in Moscow before settling on Montreal. The most logical place for that one particular package to be.

His continued insistence of playing the wounded victim irritates her, angers her far more than it should. Possibly because she knows it is a betrayal, knows that despite their words, despite their claims of mutual distrust, there _has_ been an implicit trust in this holiday.

"You're wrong on two theories so far. Care to make it a third?"

 

"You assume I would be the one to abandon you?" he demands, taking a sharp turn to merge.  
  
The idea seemed foreign to him. But then again, he abandoned John Watson, abandoned everything in London because the moment was right and it would save the people he cared about. The Woman, although more among the living than she had been, was still below the radar of the people planning to kill John, Mrs. Hudson, and Lestrade. He had no _reason_ to leave her.  
  
"Or that I'd side with my brother?" The last idea is said with a laugh, because there are few things more absurd than siding with Mycroft during this time.

 

"You don't trust me, Mr. Holmes, as you are so fond of saying," she reminds him, her voice sharp; it was a reminder to herself as much as to him. The fact that the words had, as often as not, been murmured warm against her skin or lips did not change the truth of them.

"And you've made it clear you'd rather pull the spider's web down around Moran's ears. Why shouldn't I expect that you may revert to that idea if Moran refuses to wear my leash?"

 

"Of course," Sherlock replies, because she's logical. Why not think that she'd have no choice but to run, no choice but to fight for the web she so desperately wanted? He doesn't announce loudly that he would have liked to trust her, because he _wanted_ to trust her. Nor does he announce that every action, particularly those within this car, show a level of trust. He has been a fool in regards to her. Love---it should be nothing but a chemical defect, not something he allows himself to indulge in.  
  
"So you've considered me a liar," he says. "No, no, I agree with you completely. My promises aren't meant to be trusted."

 

"You promised me the tropics, Mr. Holmes. You never promised me Moriarty's web," she corrects before she realizes the words are out.

She is defensive, she realizes, though she tells herself she has no need to be. But she refuses to dwell on how her words imply a trust she will not admit to, an implicit belief that he would in fact keep his promises. Instead, she wraps righteous indignation and anger around herself like the rumpled dress.

 

"Actions are far better than promises, Woman," he replies. He chances a glance backwards at her. She is _irritatingly_ beautiful, even in her intense anger. Hair in disarray, dress rumpled. She is aggravating. He is sorely tempted to stop the car and leave her by the side of the road in all of her confusing beauty.  
  
He looks back to the road.  
  
"I am _here_ going to Moran, when I would be significantly happier sending Mycroft in his direction," he says. "He would enact revenge far better than I."

 

She glowers at him in the rear view mirror.   
  
"By your logic, what does it mean that I went to Montreal? That I was in the cafe?" she shoots back. The wind and the speed of the car tear at her hair, whips strands of it around, and Irene thinks it is perfectly how this anger he is provoking makes her feel. Out of control.   
  
He rips the words from her in anger as easily as the wind does her hair. "If all I had wanted was your _map_ , I could have left for Moscow from Montreal. Or San Salvador."

 

"And lost your opportunity with Moran," Sherlock retorts. "Or to further manipulate me. I suppose playing the Holmes boys is always a better option."

 

She laughs, harsh and scornful. "And how exactly have I manipulated you in the last two days that makes you so certain, Mr. Holmes?"  
  
Her voice drips with the same sarcasm on the last two words as when she'd used them to refer to his brother.

 

"I don't know," he replies. He truly doesn't know, but he can't help but feel entirely betrayed. And this, he realizes as he finds himself nearly swerving into the wrong lane, is a serious, _serious_ disadvantage. Despite what they said about destroying Mycroft, despite all of their plans, this is only going to distract them.  
  
"Once this is finished with Moran, you can go to Moscow," he says. "I'll go back to Europe, clean up the situation around London. You can have everything else. We can consider our partnership over."

 

She's known since their tenuous partnership began that it was temporary, that it, by necessity, could not last. But his words still shock her, still feel like they had physically knocked the breath out of her lungs, and she says nothing in response, tries to force herself back to calmness, to equilibrium.  
  
It doesn't work, and kilometers tick by in silence and his reckless driving. "Why wait," she eventually says. "I expect you could beat me to Moscow now."

 

"I don't want the web," Sherlock says. "I only want to make certain that John, Lestrade, and Mrs. Hudson are safe. Do what you like with it. If it bothers London, I will stop it."  
  
The last is said with a short look back at her. No. No, looking back at her invokes an emotion, even as his face remains cold and stoic. He much prefers the road. It gives him no need of emotion.

 

Her hair whips around her face in the open air, and she gives up trying to tame it. She keeps her face turned away from the rear view mirror, and draws her knees to her chest despite the knowledge that it will no doubt negate the stretching she had done mere moments ago.  
  
"Then by all means leave tonight," she answers, her own voice steady, cold and distant. She knew this holiday would end, but this was not how she would have preferred it. Though she has to admit she had not thought about it ending at all, if she were being honest. "You'll be in London before tea. Moran is my business."

 

"I'm not going back until I'm certain they're safe," Sherlock snaps. "Or weren't you paying attention?"  
  
He can hear her movement in the back seat, and he imagines she's moving to a more comfortable position. He wants to do the same, to shift his shoulder somewhere that would be less painful, but that would betray the pain, allow him to show weakness. The Woman can stretch out without him properly knowing about it.  
  
"But I can leave as quickly as you'd prefer," he says. "I'm certain there's a train not far from the Falls."

 

"The solicitous martyr now," she snipes back. She refuses to apologize, refuses to admit, given his reaction, that perhaps she might have miscalculated, that she perhaps could have been wrong. She refuses, even as something cold and hollow settles in her chest.  
  
"Consider me curious how you'd be so _certain_ , as I'm obviously no longer to be trusted."

 

"Popular tourist area," Sherlock says. "And I already booked us both a train ticket. I won't be needing both."  
  
He should simply admit he's wrong, he supposes. That he leapt to an unfortunate conclusion but---but he's so _rarely_ wrong. Part of him knows that even if he is this time, he might not be the next time. And if he isn't, it might hurt far worse.

 

Another long silence stretches, and Irene finally takes the time to snatch her hair out of the wind, to work the worst of the snarls out and pin the strands back against her head. It organizes her thoughts, momentarily.  
  
"Do you still think I would keep my word, that your friends would be safe from Moriarty's web."  
  
It should be a question, not a demand, but it is both, or somewhere in between.

 

"I don't think you'll take out your anger on innocents, no," Sherlock says. "That's not your _style_ , Woman."  
  
No, he believes that his three friends would be quite safe from physical harm. As for Sherlock, though, he imagines that life would become either very interesting, or very, _very_ dull.

 

She turns and watches his reflection in the rear view mirror. Emotions rush across her own face as she watches his: a moment of genuine surprise, overtaken by a flash of guilt, then tamped down by something like forced indifference.  
  
"What would you have done, if Moran refused?"

 

"Killed him," Sherlock replies without so much as a moment's hesitation. "Before he killed you."

 

Another stab of guilt runs through her at his unhesitating answer, though it also reminds her that her instincts had been correct. She wraps her arms around her knees, resting her chin on her knees.

"And I would have lost my only link to Jim's network," she says wryly. "I relied on the Holmes boys' tender mercies once, Mr. Holmes. I won't do that again."

 

"So you prepared for the worst," Sherlock says, voice dripping with disdain. "Of course you did."  
  
It _is_ an intelligent decision, he thinks to himself. Perhaps, had he not been so wrapped up in her, he'd have made some sort of provision himself.  
  
"Woman---"  
  
No. No, he won't apologize.

 

His disdain irritates her, because she knows she'd been right to take precautions, because he is being unnecessarily stubborn and refusing to admit it.

"Of course I did," she snaps, her irritation obvious. "Only one of us has anything to lose.”

 

"Oh, yes?" Sherlock says, his tone now mocking. "Of course. And what is that, exactly? Apart from your life. this imaginary web you think you want but have yet to secure. At least with Mycroft, you knew you needed protection and money would always help. Here, you haven't---"  
  
He glances back at her, and he's surprised to find her curled on the seat in a position that can't possibly be good for her leg. She isn't stretched out in an attempt to be more comfortable, she's curled up in emotion. He stops his verbal assault and looks away, back at the road.

 

 

He stops abruptly, and she looks sharply at the rear view mirror, but he remains staring resolutely out at the road.

"I haven't what, Mr. Holmes?" she demands, her words brittle and bitter, "You were doing so very well telling me exactly how little I actually have in my possession and how I should have taken your dear brother's latest offer to stay dead in San Salvador.

 

"You're playing it up too hard, Woman," he replies. "We both know my brother is the farthest thing from _dear_ to you."  
  
He can almost feel the sharpness of her gaze. This argument is a waste of time. It doesn't matter if she's here or she's on the other side of the planet, he tells himself. So long as she's alive, he shouldn't be upset. So why is this argument affecting him?

 

"It doesn't matter."

She turns her face away from the rear view mirror, away from watching him, and up towards the sky again, to clear blue and the dark speck of an airplane disappearing behind a cloud. A sigh, as she leans back against the side of the car. To Moscow then.

She doesn't relish the thought.

"Don't go to Vienna. Terrible weather this time of year."

 

"There wouldn't be a reason to," he says, stiffly.  
  
It's odd, but her saying that makes him feel suddenly melancholic. Like the anger has drained out of him and made him feel almost like he regrets this. He doesn't want her to leave, and it isn't because he loves her. She gives him a reason to go to Vienna, even with terrible weather. She makes places more interesting, gives him someone to talk to.  
  
"I suppose I should inform you not to get yourself killed," he says. "You've been rather bad at that, as of late."

 

A quiet, melancholic laugh at that. She doesn't stretch back out, not with the entirety of the backseat at her disposal. She is not looking forward to Moscow, not the way she had looked forward to the last few places they have been. There was a cold bleakness to the prospect, one that had little to do with the weather or the locale.  
  
"That sounds almost like you're asking me to behave. You of all people should know how unlikely that is."

 

"Yes, but I don't want Mycroft informing me of your death and knowing it's the truth," he replies. "Speaking of, make certain you make his life as miserable as possible, would you?"  
  
He thinks briefly of their unconventional coupling the previous night, discussing how they'd ruin Mycroft together. Relationships end so quickly, it's rather jarring.  
  
"I won't miss you," he announces. He thinks it's the truth.

 

She doesn't tell him she isn't obligated to do anything to Mycroft Holmes. She doesn't because she knows she will, because it will be interesting to pull away at Mycroft Holmes' tapestry, because there will be so few truly interesting diversions now that this is over. Because it will be a reminder of their brief dalliance.  
  
Dreadfully sentimental, that.  
  
"Oh? I recall a conversation where you once said the exact opposite."

 

"Do you?" Sherlock says, eyes on the road. "I don't."  
  
He does, of course. He remembers everything. He certainly recalls something as recent as their time in the Bahamas. He doesn't even bother trying to hide the lie from his voice. It would be a waste of time with her.

 

The lie is so blatant, so obvious that it would be a waste of time telling him he was lying. She doesn't look in the rear view mirror, instead staring at the back of his head, at once irritated and exasperated.   
  
"You are insufferable. If I asked you to stay, I suppose you'd refuse on principle?"

 

"And why would you do that?" he asks, forcing no emotion to his voice. He refuses to sound hopeful. Were this John Watson in the backseat, he'd make hopefulness appear in his voice, as he knows it would be accepted, and John would cave. The Woman, however, would see through that. Even if it were genuine, she might not see that.

 

She glares at the back of his head, knowing he cannot see it. She refuses to tell him, to admit that she is not ready for their holiday to end, that Moscow alone holds little interest despite the waiting prize. She refuses to beg.  
  
"Make a deduction, Mr. Holmes," she answers tartly. "Call it a chance to redeem yourself for three wrong answers today."  
  
A pause, and she adds quietly, almost willing the whipping wind to steal the word away so that she does not have to admit to it.  
  
"Please."

 

She has always been far better at expressing emotions than he. He remembers in Nassau, when she was able to ask him to stay. He had been completely incapable of the same act only a week prior. And now, here, he finds himself not wanting to go, but she is the one saying _please_.  
  
He wants to say yes. He can feel that, feel that longing. It settles in him, down in his core. The longing to say _yes_ reminds him of the desire to change the Woman's mobile text alert noise. It was there, but the desire to hear her far overtook it, so the desire settled down into nothing. Right now, the desire to say yes, to _stay_ , is settling down under the fear that she might betray him again.  
  
But then again, it is not as though he threw out his own mobile for honest reasons, either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so ends another wild ride (pun intended) with Sherlock and Irene in _Death Takes A Holiday_. As always, DTaH will return with its next installment _Death Takes A Holiday: The Falls of Niagara_ , sometime in March, but no exact dates at the moment, as life is eating Lyra alive.
> 
> Thanks for sticking with us!


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